i love you btw, the world is big, but you're never alone in it, despite what the walls might tell you

i definitely think it's worth checking out the settings. and if you still don't like it, there's a lot of non-Google options

here's a place you can check if you end up wanting something else (it also has like anything else you could want): fmhy.net/internet-too...

but you'd be able to interact with almost anyone using Mastodon, Misskey, Pixelfed, Friendica, etc.

it's all federated and intercompatible, and each one is analogous to an existing platform (Friendica is like Facebook, Mastodon = Twitter, Pixelfed = Instagram, etc.)

a nice site if ur curious:

and as a last note, bc i saw you mention Vivaldi having their own social media, it's actually a Mastodon instance, so it's fully integrated into the fediverse, so it's not a bad way to get into fedi either (the population is a lot smaller and more niche than Bsky though, but it's also more open rn)

DDG uses Bing results and has less features, but Startpage uses Google results (both minus the AI, however) and has certain features i like (like the shopping tab for searching across different online stores). i actually used to prefer DDG and Bing's results, but Google's image search is way better

i keep both installed, but i won't rely on Vivaldi unless they eventually figure out a way to maintain Manifest V2-compatibility or at least compatibility for certain functions (which is what FF does)

also I really love Startpage bc it's like a better DuckDuckGo.

you can change it in the Startpage settings! it's not a browser behavior, and it's not their search engine (unlike everything else).

it's my favorite browser, but i main Firefox because Vivaldi is still Chromium-based and eventually certain extensions i depend on will be dead in the water :(